Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Location: Gila National Forest, New Mexico

Last night I drove all the way up to the Gila Hot Springs to have a soak. I had seen some pictures online that lead me to believe it was a large natural pool just off the Gila River. I drove for an hour up a long and twisting road to arrive just before sunset. I then headed down through a ranch to the springs. There were three pools, they were roughly the size of children’s wading pools, they were fairly warm but not hot, and there was quite a few people there soaking. I ended up soaking for about an hour with an older man, his three sons, and granddaughter who were all doing some forced bonding.

The man and I spoke about Mt. Kaylash, Tibet and Nepal, and it turns out the man was a practicing Buddhist. It was nice to connect with these people, but I was sad not to have a large deserted mountain hot spring all to myself.

However this morning I woke up in the Gila National Forest to this beautiful view, which made the trek up all worthwhile. I would have loved to go for a hike with Moses (pictured here deep in meditation) but instead had an appointment at a Silver City garage to attend. Veronica’s speedometer has been acting wonky affecting my transmission… but it’s nothing major I’m sure.

The garage greeted me with NRA signs everywhere with sayings like, “My neighbor doesn’t believe in guns, so I’ll respect his opinion and not protect him if someone breaks in!” I immediately headed back to the van and removed the ‘allergic to republicans’ sticker on my dash and tried to make the place look a little less hippied-out. Good Luck!

After being a little frustrated on the lack of communication at the garage, I began talking to the mechanic about his antique bullet collection on the counter. Well if there’s a way to an NRA’ers heart that’s it! He opened up to me, talked about history, war, how we’re all really the same ‘mixed bag’ when it comes down to race, and how it’s silly we’re all out killing each other. You can’t judge a man by his NRA poster!

I agreed to change the speedometer sensor even though it wasn’t for certain the problem, paid under a hundred bucks for the part and a few hours of labor, and was on my way.

peace,
d